In the summer of 2018 the local community, along with support from Ward Councillors, saved the Cherries Community Garden from retail developers who wanted to rip it up and build a supermarket on the site.
The Friends group, all volunteers from the local community, successfully registered the garden as an asset of community value, took over the management of the garden under licence with the Council, and over four eventful years created a community garden to be proud of, attaining the highest grade, Level 5, outstanding in the RHS In Your Neighbourhood Awards in 2021.
Following the initial success, then came a prolonged period of inactivity, mainly down to a lack of volunteers, leadership and community engagement.
The garden continues to be maintained by a small group of dedicated volunteers, however without any real community engagement there hasn’t been any events arranged for a couple of years.
They would like to change that by relaunching the Friends of the Cherries Community Garden and develop further engagement with the community.
They aim to do this by improving communication channels through the launch of a dedicated website which will enable better sharing of ideas within the community.
They have recently joined Grass Roots of Wigan, which will provide the Friends group with more local network support, and hopefully open the doors to a range of different funding opportunities to help with plans to further develop the garden for the benefit of the community.
